Page 33: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (March 2006)

March 2006 33

By Edward Lundquist

Marinette Marine, a division of the

Manitowoc Company, is building the first Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) at its

Marinette, Wis., shipyard. Many new and special techniques are being employed to build this new class of ship.

LCS is being built to the "Navy Vessel

Rules" standard, and will be the first

U.S. Navy combatant classified by the

American Bureau of Shipping.

The first ship must be built in 24 months, but subsequent ships, and a learning curve should allow the team to complete future ships in 18 to 20 months.

With any first of a class vessel, the challenge and the opportunity are in overcoming the learning curve. "We're learning as we go along," said Al

Bernard, Manitowoc's senior vice presi- dent.

Marinette is using a new type of weld- ing for LCS, called "Surface Tension

Transfer Welding." It's faster, uses less heat, and has less distortion," said Kevin

Shaver, Marinette's director of manufac- turing.

The ship will be assembled upside down. "All of our work is hands down instead of working upright into awk- ward positions. This makes it easier for the welders and the quality is better," said Shaver.

To achieve high speeds, LCS must be much lighter. LCS will have a HSLA 80 steel hull, with smaller, lighter frames and a thinner, stronger skin.

The lighter steel requires more accu- rate welds since LCS is being built to very tight tolerances. Every seam is vacuum box checked by Marinette workers under the supervision of ABS and the Navy's Supervisor of

Shipbuilding (SupShip). "Plate is thinner than a traditional

Navy cruiser or destroyer hull, but is is equal to or improved over frigate hulls.

Thinner plate means less weight, and less weight means more speed," said

Shaver. "There is added 'structure' up in the bow because of the high speed and the slamming against the thinner plates." "All of our work is done indoors," said

Bernard. That's important because

Marinette gets 40 inches of snow a year, and the average temperature in the win- ter is 19-degrees (F)."

Marinette is employing extensive "pre-outfitting," where piping, wiring and insulation are installed into the sec- tions of the hull and superstructure before erection. "Each section will be about 80 percent complete when it is mated with the rest of the ship," said

Shaver. "All we have to do is join up the wiring and piping." "When we roll the ship out, it will be 80 to 85 percent complete before it goes into the water," he said. "Then we'll put on the masts and other items that we

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